


In the Eyes of the Father

by endeni



Series: Eyes [2]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Blanket Permission, Incest, M/M, Podfic & Podficced Works, Podfic Available, Podfic Welcome, Wordcount: 5.000-10.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-25
Updated: 2016-04-25
Packaged: 2018-06-04 10:44:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6654865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/endeni/pseuds/endeni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.” - Oscar Wilde</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Luke

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DoreyG](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/gifts).



> For DoreyG, a sequel that's more in line with your original prompt... ;)

Luke tries to outfly their pursuers but he can't do much in this ship, this was supposed to be a simple recon mission, they weren't supposed to attract attention. Ben is targeting the fighters, hitting them one after another with deadly aim, thinning their numbers, but there are too many of them and the main ship is getting too close, soon their cannons will be in range and there's no more time, Luke sets the jump. Just as their ship takes a hit.

They reappear over a gas giant in an unknown region of space with a screeching sound of protest, all alarms going off.

“I'm losing control!” Luke shouts, as he desperately checks the sensors for somewhere to land.

“There!” Ben cries and Luke sees it, a little moon orbiting over the large white planet.

“Hold on, Ben, this is going to be rough,” Luke says just before they impact, hard.

When Luke comes to, his head is pounding fiercely. He touches his temple and his hand comes back stuck with blood. Slowly, painfully, he turns his head to check on Ben and finds him motionless on his seat, a pool of red starting to spread over his side.

“Ben!”

He tries to disentangle himself from the safety strap, to reach the other seat. As he gets up a wave of dizziness hits him but Luke rides it out, bends to look at Ben. It's a shard of something, stuck inside him, just under his ribcage.

 _Don't take it out_ , Luke thinks, _he'll only bleed out faster_.

Luke checks the console.

They're out of power, out of anything. He can't fix Ben here. And soon enough, they'll run out of breathable air. If the prohibitive temperature on the moon won't kill them first.

Luke unties Ben from his seat and tries to move him to the small cabin out back. The boy is heavy, all long limbs, and Luke's head can't seem to let him focus, he can't-

He stumbles, once, twice, dragging Ben's body across the ship's floor. He's dragged his father's dying body just like this, Luke thinks, his own body broken by grief and torture.

 _Not again_ , he thinks, _please, not again_.

Luke reaches the cot, throws away the blankets and positions Ben on it, then he crawls beside him too, putting back the covers over both of them, rising his arms and legs to circle Ben's body. Then, he reaches with his powers to feel around the edges of the wound. He presses down, stopping the blood from coming out. He can't do anything for the internal bleeding, not until he takes out that horrible bit of something carving Ben's insides. Luke wants it _out_ but he can't, he must not.

 _Focus_ , he commands himself.

Already shaking from the cold, Luke lays down his aching head over Ben's chest.

_Still breathing._

From his position on the cot, Luke can see the flickering light of the distress signal.

He just hopes the Resistance will be able to find them, hopefully before anyone else does.

 

Luke hears a rustle of sound and opens his eyes. He doesn't remember closing them.

He sees a blurry image and there's another low sound again, like a gurgle, and when his vision doesn't resolve itself into recognizable shapes, Luke reacts and _pushes_.

“Woah,” he hears, “kid, it's me, it's OK.” And: “We have to stop meeting like this, it's colder than the coldest Corellian hell in here.” And then, gentle, cajoling, “Come on, let me see our boy here. It's OK, kid, you did good, I got it now, I got _him_.” And Luke hears the reassuring tone just as he can hear the paralyzing fear inside the other man. _So much blood. Ben, my boy._ It's too much, the conflict of it is pulsing against his temples.

 _Han_ , he thinks then, the name surging into his mind like a revelation.

Luke gives himself permission to let go then, gives himself permission to pass out.

 

He wakes up to white walls and the regular beeping of machines.

 _Medical Bay_ , he thinks mechanically and tries to prop himself up from his supine position. At his side, a familiar dirtywhirl of energy calls to him and Luke can sense Ben's presence even before seeing his curly head raise from its bowed position.

_Ben._

Dark eyes, looking at him in relief.

Luke blinks, once, twice. He can't seem to- He sees Ben, his hands still clasped in front of him as if in prayer, and at the same time, like two superimposed images, he can see the Force coming off of him, white-hot and violent.

“Master,” Ben says, his tone worried.

“I just,” Luke tries to say, his voice heavy with disuse.

“Master Skywalker, I see you're awake. Feeling dizzy?” asks Doctor Kalonia, approaching his cot.

“I-” Luke says, “Yes, a little.”

The doctor nods, like it was to be expected, “You gave us quite a scare, you know? We never really know how to treat head-injuries when it's one of you guys.”

Luke snorts.

The doctor's eyes turn toward Ben, one of her eyebrow raising: “Shouldn't you be somewhere else, young man? On your own cot, where you're supposed to be resting?”

That's when Luke notices the white bandages around Ben's chest.

All at once, he remembers. The pain, the fear.

 _Thank the Force_ , he thinks, _he’s alive._

Ben is giving the doctor a challenging, almost arrogant smile, as if to say: I'd like to see you try. And, yes, for a moment Luke can see the shadow of what could have been, what that arrogance could have led them to. What Luke's own blindness could have led them to.

Luke lets his head fall back against the cushions and raises an eyebrow of his own. “Ben,” he says in a tired tone.

“I'm not the one who exhausted himself to the point of unconsciousness,” Ben replies pointedly, “nothing a bit- OK, _a lot_ , of bacta couldn't fix.”

“And I’m grateful for that,” Luke says. _You don’t know how much._

He hears the doctor leave. He tries not to look at the swirling of energy surrounding Ben. Instead, he finds himself tracing the familiar features of Ben's face, his intense eyes, the line of his mouth.

Luke closes his eyes. _Inappropriate,_ he tells himself viciously. He shakes his head, as if to shake away that thought.

Luke feels Ben moving to take his hand, perhaps sensing his turmoil, and Luke can't help it, he takes his hand back like he's been burned. Not now, he thinks, not when I'm so weak.

He sees hurt flash on Ben's eyes and he regrets his reaction immediately. Stars, if he weren't so tired-

“Luke!”

Luke turns his head toward Leia's voice, toward the warm glow of the Force around her. “We were so worried,” say says, coming into the Medical Bay with Han.

She bends to hug him and, oh, it’s like being enveloped into a warm, soft-smelling blanket. Like coming home.

“I wasn't the one who got his stomach pierced through,” Luke answers against her hair, aiming for levity and unconsciously echoing Ben's words.

“Mara and Rey?” he asks a moment later, because he needs to know even if he dreads the answer.

Han shakes his head, his expression serious.

“No news since your ships got separated,” confirms Leia with a sigh.

Luke closes his eyes for a moment, trying to gather his strength. “We have to find them,” he says.

At his side, Ben nods. His eyes have gone cold and dangerous, “We will.”

 

Later that day, Luke is settling into his own room for the night. Han is by his side, helping him into the bed.

“Not trusting you not to slip down and crack your damn head open again, kid.”

Luke almost rolls his eyes. “At this point I can recuperate on my bed as well as any other place, no need to hog the Med Bay.”

Behind his father, Ben looks worn, anxious. He’s staring at Luke with one eyebrow raised and his arms crossed in front of him, as if to say: _Bullshit_.

Luke finds himself suppressing a tired laugh.

“Yeah, right, suit yourself,” Han says with a snort of his own.

“OK, then, I'll let you sleep now. We’ll come by tomorrow morning,” Han grips Ben affectionately by the shoulder and gets out.

The door slides shut, leaving Luke alone with the chaos of warring emotions that surrounds Ben.

Luke watches the boy tense up. “Right, I’m going too,” he says and turns to do so.

“Don’t,” Luke says.

Ben turns his head toward him, his body still positioned toward the door.

And he’s using his battle stance, Luke realizes, the one he’d taught him, light on his feet and balanced weight, and Luke’s heart constricts at the thought of Ben assuming that position unconsciously, like being with Luke is something for which he needs to prepare himself, needs to put his own defenses up.

Yes, Luke thinks, a warrior. Someone who years ago had chosen to follow Luke’s cause, to stand by his side, despite all the pain he knew he would have brought to himself by doing so.

And what for, Luke asks himself, disgusted. For someone who can’t even bring himself to touch his hand.

“I'm sorry, my boy,” Luke says. And, stars, sometimes Luke feels like he's spent all his life saying those same words to Ben.

 _I’m sorry_ , he continues, _about before. You don’t deserve that. I-_

Ben’s eyes are wide, his full lips pressed into a thin line. “There’s no need,” he replies, almost tonelessly. “I’ll go now, you’ll rest more easily without a Force-user nearby.”

“I really wouldn’t,” Luke says, the words spilling out of his mouth. And he’s aware of how utterly self-centered it is, but he can’t stop himself. “When I close my eyes, I-” he stops, tries again, “I thought-”

He sighs.

 _I thought you'd have died in my arms like my father_ , he admits.

Luke raises a hand to his head, the sense-memory of that particular moment too strong to hide. The blood, the desperation, it all comes pouring out of him. (Not again, please, not again.)

The Force presence around Ben shifts into of one shock and amazement.

 _I thought I'd lost you too_ , Ben sends back after a while. A simple, clear thought, the pain around it sharp like glass shards. _Thought I'd never see you wake up again._

Ben comes closer then, until he’s standing by the side of Luke’s bed.

Sitting up, Luke's head is at the exact height of Ben's stomach and the temptation to touch is too strong.

Slowly, Luke bends forward, until his forehead is lying against Ben's hip. Nothing more than gentle contact. He does what he's wanted to do all day, concentrates on that single point of contact and pushes away all the rest. He focuses just on Ben, on the fact that he's breathing and warm and very much alive besides him. Not dying or unconscious or-

 _I’m here_ , Luke sends. _We made it._

He feels Ben's hands on his hair, around the nape of his neck. Gentle, tentative.

“Thought you were worried I'd lose my cool and jump your old bones at a mere touch,” Ben says, his tone half laughing, half pained.

Luke shakes his head, still not moving from his spot. “It's not you I was worried about, Ben,” he confesses, his voice deep with the weight of his unspoken emotions.

He raises his eyes and Ben is bending down to kiss him. Sweet and hesitant and desperate all at once.

This time, Luke doesn't stop him.


	2. Han

The chime gets no answer.

“You in there, kid?” Han yells, earning him weird glances from the personnel walking by the corridor.

Hell, he's known Luke Skywalker ever since he was a naive farm-boy, he can call the Grand Master of the New Jedi Order however he damn well pleases.

Han looks at Chewie with a worried frown.

“Fuck it”, he decides and punches in his override code.

He’s not fucking ready for what he finds on the other side.

For Luke, getting out of the bed where Ben is lying, the boy’s naked shoulders and chest emerging from the covers, hair still tousled, eyes wide open in surprise.

Han’s vision goes red with fury.

He surges forward, grabs Luke by his undershirt and lands a punch on his face. Then he does it again, sending him sprawling to the floor.

Chewie grabs him by the arm and tries to hold him back but he must not be trying very hard because Han manages to get out of his grasp.

Han can't believe it. His friend, his fucking brother-in-law.

“You bastard, you _pervert_ ,” Han roars, launching himself back at Luke, “I trusted you, we fucking trusted you!” He pulls his arm back for another punch, then another. “How fucking long has this been going on?”

He thinks: how could you do this to my boy? How could you do this to me, to Leia? After everything we went through.

Then, against his conscious will, Han feels his whole body freeze. He sets his furious eyes on the man in front of him but he sees his own startled expression reflected back.

His son enters his field of vision. His stern gaze is fixed on Han, a clear menace in his eyes.

Han stays suspended like that for an infinite moment.

He's reminded more than anything of that day in Cloud City, of Vader making his blaster fly out of his hand. Vader, trapping him in carbonite.

 _There's too much Vader in him_ , Leia had said. And it’s true, Han can see it now.

That fierceness, though, the fury behind Ben’s eyes, it’s also very much like his mother’s. Leia, screaming at him during one of their rows. Leia, ferociously protective of her cause.

He wonders if that’s what Luke sees too, him and Leia in Ben. He wonders if that’s the reason.

By his side, Chewie is growling at Ben to let his father go, but the noise is coming to Han as if from a distance.

Looking at Ben now, Han doesn’t see the young boy he remembers but the preternatural stillness and pose Luke has displayed ever since Han has been released from his carbonite imprisonment. It’s Luke and his fucking Force, twisting his son into something he can't recognize.

Fucking Jedi. To think he used to be jealous of Luke and Leia, of the connection they shared.

Used to feel guilty for his relationship with Leia, for cutting the kid out.

He wants to laugh. Luke got something of his all right in the end.

“Ben.” Luke's tone isn't raised any higher than normal but it carries the strictness of an order.

Abruptly, Han is free to move again.

He sags to the floor, like a marionette without strings.

He looks up at his son as he moves towards Luke.

It's like a cold shower, seeing Luke sitting up placidly, with his lip split and bloody, his cheek bruised red, an eye already swelling.

Han watches him calming putting his robes over himself and thinks: he let me hurt him. He didn't even try to defend himself.

 _Of course_ , Han berates himself. _Luke is a fucking Jedi Master, he could cut you in half without even touching you._

His son raises a hand and Han watches transfixed as the bruising and swelling disappear and the cut on Luke's lip knits himself back together, leaving behind only dried blood.

He watches Luke move his metal hand, as if to grab Ben's arm, and then stop mid-motion, looking guiltily back at Han. He sees the forbidden mask on his son's face dissolve into a look of almost pained uncertainty that makes him seem younger than his thirty years.

That's the moment when Kes Dameron's son rushes through the door. Only to come to an abrupt halt at the tension in the room, his white and orange droid rolling straight against his legs, making him almost lose balance.

“Uh... Commander Solo, Master Skywalker,” he says, a smile freezing on his lips as he registers what’s going on, “Sorry to interrupt, you- you weren’t answering your comms and we just received a message from Rey.”

_Rey._

“What message,” Han asks, “What does it say?”

“She escaped,” Dameron says, “a stormtrooper helped her, she’s on her way home from Jakku.”

Han looks at Chewbacca. The urge to pound his brother-in-law into the floor hasn't really vanished, nor has his burning anger and the confusion but this- little Rey, if they've found her... Chewie is already heading to the door, growling at Han to get going too.

 

Thanks to Rey’s new friend, they have the coordinates they were looking for. The Starkiller base is protected by shields but the First Order's ship orbiting over it is much more vulnerable so that's where they focus their attack.

They manage to get on board, then they split up, trying to obtain the codes they need.

Han is with Luke and Ben, he has no intention of leaving those two alone ever again.

They run through the corridors, following whatever mumbo-jumbo Force shit is telling Luke and Ben where to go.

They reach the command center and there is Snoke, with his twisted little body and his scarred face.

A shot almost takes Han's head off. He bends down to take cover, drawing out his weapon to shoot back. At his side, Luke and Ben spring into motion, seemingly impervious to blaster fire.

Han looks at them, interlocked into a mortal duel with Snoke, fighting like they're a single entity, and suddenly there's half-forgotten memory at the back of his traitorous mind. The Negotiator and the Hero With No Fear, from the HoloNet specials when he was still a kid. That's what he's seeing. Kenobi and Skywalker, the stuff of legends.

A chrome tin-can jumps out of its hiding spot, arm already raised to fire. Han shoots the trooper down a moment too late.

He sees Ben dodge the shot, preternatural alert, and end right into the path of Snoke’s blade. Sees Luke jump forward to shield Ben, and getting impaled instead.

Han stands there and watch, as if paralyzed.

For a moment, Luke and Snoke lie trapped in a grotesque display, a four-legged being, Snoke's lightsaber protruding from Luke's back.

Then Snoke pulls back his blade and Luke's body falls to the ground.

Han hears Ben muffled scream, an animal, desperate sound.

He watches as Ben and Snoke start circling each other, moving around Luke's body on the floor.

“So, it's you and me at last, boy. Oh, you should have come to me sooner,” Snoke is saying with a smirk. “But there's still time for you to join me. You won't be held down by his interference now,” he says gesturing toward Luke's body.

Han watches Ben, the deadly grip on his weapon, the stiff way he's holding himself, how he's obviously trying to stop himself from charging heedlessly forward. “You're right,” his boy is saying, his eyes stone cold, “you just killed the only person that stopped me from becoming someone like you”, he says before raising his blade. “You’ll regret that.”

Then, like someone had tuned off a switch, their circling, hypnotic movements become frenzied again.

Ben and Snoke run, jump, spin around the room, exchanging lighting-quick blows, flashes of light cutting the hair, until Snoke ends up on the ground, his lightsaber skittering along the metal floor.

“Luke!” someone is screaming and Han turns to see Rey come running into the room, the others following close behind.

He turns back to watch Ben raise his lightsaber over Snoke's head and then bring it down in front of him in one swift motion.

“No, wait!” Rey is yelling, charging forward with her sword in her hand.

Han runs after her. He sees Snoke's head rolling on the floor.

Rey comes to a halt, staring at the detached head. Han takes a few more steps.

“Ben,” he calls but Ben is not looking at him, he’s looking at Luke’s body.

Han extends a hand to grab his son by the shoulder and gets him to turn around. He hears a soft gasp from Rey.

 _Something is wrong with his eyes,_ Han thinks, uncomprehending _._

Rey grabs him and unceremoniously pushes him behind her, her sword raised high in front of her and looking at Ben with something like fear.

A moment passes. Ben, Rey and Han stand frozen like that, facing each other, not saying a word.

Then, a movement out of the corner of Han's vision.

Ben's freaky yellow eyes jerk toward Luke’s body.

Han sees Luke’s lips move and fuck, he’s still alive.

In a heartbeat, Ben is bending down, taking Luke's head into his lap.

Han moves to reach him but Rey grabs him by the arm. Han looks back at her and she’s shaking her head, her eyes still wide with apprehension. Tears start running down her cheeks.

So Han doesn’t move. He watches his son bend his head and put his forehead against Luke’s, hears a low whispering of words. When Rey’s grip goes slack, Han knows that, whatever life force still was inside Luke’s body, it's gone now that he’s said goodbye to his son.

When Ben lifts his head again, his eyes are clear, back to their usual color.


	3. Ben

A violent shudder goes through the ship. The viewports fill with brilliant light. Distantly, Ben watches the Starkiller base blowing up, the ship shaking with the shockwave.

In his mind, a bright spot of light that had been hiding just outside his focus flickers and fades out.

_Mara._

His master had been right, Ben thinks dazedly, a crash isn't enough to kill Mara Jade.

Instead, she went out with a bang, taking the rest of the Order with her.

Ben closes his eyes a moment and lets go of his grip on his master's body, letting his head lie on the cold floor.

Slowly, almost painfully, he raises up, pausing a moment to take a deep breath that doesn't help him at all, then he walks to the nearest comm station.

“This is Jedi Master Ben Solo.” he says into the comm, “your leader is dead, your base has been destroyed.” And then, because he owes it to his master, “Surrender now and you will not be harmed.”

 

After, Ben's grief is like a physical thing.

He doesn't cry, the tears won't come to him. He just sit in his room, unable to sleep, unable to do anything.

He keeps reviving his master's death, keeps thinking of what he showed him before dying.

He thinks of the Rey in his master’s vision, growing up alone in the desert, waiting for a family that would never come back. Of Mara, hiding little Rey before being cut down by a masked figure, just like all his master's students, their bodies piling up on the ground.

Planets, being wiped away in a flash of light. His father, standing on top of a bridge, facing that monster. Underneath the mask, Ben’s own face.

Ben sees himself slicing his father through with his lightsaber. Himself, fighting against Rey to the death.

Ben sits in his room and pictures a universe where Luke had told him no. Where he had turned to Snoke instead.

A universe where so many people are dead, his own father too, and yet his master is still impossibly alive.

He sits and tries not to wonder if, given the chance, he would go back and make that future come true instead.

He stands up, goes to his terminal and rewatches Mara's last message.

She's dressed in Stormtrooper gear, her white-streaked red hair shining in the artificial light of the base.

“Fuck the Empire,” she's saying, her hands on the trigger, “Fuck the First Order!”

He watches the violent flash of light after, watches as the message starts playing again.

In his darkest moments, Mara's been his inspiration, someone who went dark and came back to tell the tale.

Now she's dead too.

Ben stops the recording and prepares himself to get out. It's time.

Outside, he finds his father waiting for him.

Ben raises an eyebrow.

“I'm worried about you,” his father says with a placating tone.

"Right,” Ben says and part of himself is tempted to just keep on walking. To just go, until he reaches his master's funeral pyre. And maybe don't stop even there, maybe the warm embrace of the fire is better, better than this constant misery. “If this about me going all evil and crazy-eyed on the ship I'd say you're right to be worried,” he says in an even tone.

His father is shaking his head, “What? Ben, no-”

Ben snorts. “Why not? You've always watched me like I was a bomb about to explode. And you were right after all, there's something really wrong with me. The truth is, I don't know how I'm supposed to keep it in check now that my Master is gone and Mara is dead too.”

_Not now that I can't stand to look at the pain in Rey's eyes, nor at the contempt in yours._

“That's not-” his father tries to say.

“Or is this about me and Luke?” and, stars, the pain is so sharp, just saying his name.

“I take it mother doesn't know," Ben can't help asking, because he needs something else to dull the pain, he needs the anger.

His father makes a sound that's almost like a snort. "Know what? Didn't want to break her heart."

"That's fucking rich," Ben finds himself saying and there it is, the rage he was looking for.

 _Rage is better_ , he thinks.

“Ben,” his father says with a warning tone. “I know you think you loved him but he was your uncle and your teacher and- and you were just a kid and he took advantage-”

For a moment, Ben can clearly envision raising his hand and closing it around his father's neck, using the Force and his own physical strength to lift him up from the ground and slam him against the wall.

Something must have shown in his face because his father grows suddenly quiet.

“I was fifteen the first time I met him,” Ben says quietly, almost in a whisper. “Luke wasn't afraid of me, or afraid of that part of himself that made him special. He was the most powerful man I ever met and he was _kind_. And so alone I could feel it in my bones, even with all his students to teach to-”

Ben stops, takes a pained breath, “And it was _me_ , who pushed, who asked, who wanted. He never touched me, not until that last mission when I thought-”

_I thought I'd lost him, as I have now._

“Don't you dare talk about him like that,” he says, his tone final.

Looking at the mixture of confusion and sadness in his father's eyes, Ben suddenly finds his rage subside, giving way to that dull pain once again.

He turns around, starts to walk. “Let's go,” he says briskly, “I don't want to be late.”

 

All of the Resistance and all of Luke's Jedi are gathered around the pyre, everyone has come to say their goodbyes.

People welcome Ben with a nod of the head, voices low in respect.

“Grand Master,” the Jedi Knights greet him, “Grand Master Solo.”

Rey stops to stand by his side. “Grand Master,” she says too and it’s too much.

Ben swallows. “I thought Mara-” but of course, Mara is dead. Ben sighs, shakes his head. “I mean, do you really think this a good idea? There must be someone else.”

Rey looks back, her eyes sad and impossibly kind. “He would have wanted it to be you,” she says simply. “And we all want it too.”

Ben almost snorts.

The bright flames of the funeral pyre illuminate the night.

Ben looks into the fire and feels cold and hollow despite its heat.

His father is standing near too, his arm around his mother, who's sobbing quietly.

“You saw,” Ben says simply. “You’ve seen what happened.”

Rey nods, her expression serene. “I’ve seen you lose the love of your life and come back,” she says quietly, “It’s more than Anakin Skywalker ever managed, or so I’m told.” She turns back to look at the flames.

Ben’s eyes grow wide in shock. “You mean you-”

“Everybody knew,” she says simply, “or, at least, those who have observing eyes did, you know how it is.”

Ben doesn't know how it is.

 _And no-one cared_ , he asks, shaking his head in wonder.

Rey shrugs. “When I was his prisoner, Snoke told me he was my real father, the one who created me.”

Ben raises his head in alarm.

“It's OK,” Rey says quietly, “I knew already, Luke told me. How Mara smuggled me in, gave me my name. Luke was the one who raised me, though, not Snoke. I’d say it counts for much more than some dead mad man’s delusions. And you've always been by Luke's side, you raised me as much as he did. Honestly, you two loving each other was the most normal part of my childhood.”

“I’m sorry," Ben says, suddenly feeling ashamed, "I'm supposed to be the one to-”

Rey shakes her head. “I'm sorry too,” Rey says, “Mostly, I just wanted you two to get together and stop being miserable all the time.”

Ben smiles a small smile, impossibly touched.

Well, at least they managed that. For a whole night.

He raises an arm to circle Rey’s shoulders and press her against her side, her warm, solid presence an anchor against the chill of the night, the chill he feels inside.

Yes, there's much to live for, Ben reminds himself as he stands there, watching the fire consume the body of his master. There's still Rey and Ben has to take care of her. He owes it to Luke, owes it to Mara.

All his life, Ben he has striven to mold himself into a shape his master would love. The truth is, even now in his death, he can't betray that habit. He'd be like water without a vase. Honoring Luke's legacy is not just an act of love but also an act of survival. The only way for him to survive is to keep being Luke's Ben.

“It's OK,” Ben says quietly. “We still have each other. I’m not leaving you alone,” he promises. _Not again._

Rey turns to press her face against his shoulder.

 _Yes_ , Ben thinks,  _I will finish what you started._

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[PODFIC] In the Eyes of the Father](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6760357) by [KeeperofSeeds](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KeeperofSeeds/pseuds/KeeperofSeeds)




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